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If you've never done night photography, go to Easy Way.
If your more advanced, read on.
• Set the ISO to 1600.
• Set the exposure mode to Program (P) or Night Landscape.
Or, use a night photography scene mode.
• Photograph at twilight.
• Be safe.
Then, come back and read the rest of this tip.
• Make sure your camera battery is fully charged, and bring spares.
Long exposures consume batteries quickly.
• Tripod?
You may not want to use a tripod, at first.
Tripods can slow down your spontaneity.
Also, when you're looking through the viewfinder of a camera on a tripod, you can become less aware of your surroundings.
You can set your camera on a newspaper box, or brace it against a lamppost.
Having to look for a quasi-tripod can make for a better photograph.
• Bring a small flashlight, or a headband LED light, so you can see your camera settings.
• Bring a timer for long exposures.
• Summer? Bring bug repellent.
• If you'll be near a road, wear a reflective vest.
• Bring another photographer along, or a patient friend.
When photographing, one can become engrossed and less aware of the surroundings.
Bring along a second set of eyes.
"Stop! There's a cliff."
Even if you don't photograph bridges, power plants, and the like, you may be confronted by security guards and police.
If you're a student, bring along your identification card.
"I'm doing a photography assignment."
Bring along a portfolio of 4x6 inch prints of your work, to show that what you're doing is harmless.
"Here's what I do."
While you have the right to photograph in public places, you may want to leave if you're confronted.
Download lawyer Bert Krages' The Photographer's Right - A Downloadable Flyer.
Go to Legal.
You can photograph at any time of night.
If there's a best time, twilight is it.
Remember, the contrast of a scene will increase when photographed.
The bright blue sky at twilight may become a dark blue as a photograph.
Go to WYSINWYG (What Youis See Is NOT What You Get).
Flare is a whitish haze along with, often, but not always, geometric shapes.
Flare is created when you aim your camera toward a bright light source, such as a street light.
You can reduce flare by using a lens hood, or by shading the lens with your hand or a piece of black cardboard.
Go to Flare.
At first, you may want to use automatic white balance (AWB).
You can set the white balance to match the color of the predominate light source.
Sodium vapor lights, the most common street lights, are yellow to our eyes, and orange on photographs.
Use the light bulb white balance icon, or a custom or preset white balance setting.
Mercury vapor lights appear blue to our eyes, and green on photographs.
There's no appropriate white balance icon for mercury vapor lights.
You can use a custom or preset white balance setting.
If the scene has different colored light sources, set the white balance to match the color of the predominate light source.
If the light sources are contributing equally, use a custom or preset white balance setting.
Contrary to what you see in films, moonlight isn't blue.
It's sunlight reflected off of the moon.
So, use the sun white balance icon.
Go to White Balance.
Use the Program (P) or Night Landscape exposure modes, or a night photography scene mode.
Your flash may pop up if you use the Auto exposure mode, or the exposure modes which are denoted by icons, such as the mountain icon.
The Auto exposure mode may be designated by a green rectangle icon or a green camera icon.
If your flash pops up, press the button with the lightning bolt icon, and select the icon on the LCD screen that has a lightning bolt in a circle with a diagonal line.
Use the Program (P) or Night Landscape exposure modes, at first.
Your flash may pop up if you use the Auto exposure mode, or the exposure modes which are denoted by icons, such as the mountain icon.
The Auto exposure mode may be designated by a green rectangle icon or a green camera icon.
Use a high ISO setting, such as ISO 1600, at first.
Later, when using a tripod, use lower ISO settings.
Higher ISO settings have more noise, but you probably won't need a tripod.
When you use high ISO settings, and long exposures, noise may result.
Noise is specs of the wrong brightness and the wrong color.
Go to Noise Reduction.
Use the exposure compensation feature to bracket your exposures widely.
Bracketing is when you take several photographs at different settings.
You'll have a series of photographs with different "shades."
Go to Bracketing.
Typically, there's a button on your camera with a +/- icon.
Press and hold the button, and move a knob to shift the exposure up and down.
| -2 | ♦ | ♦ | -1 | ♦ | ♦ | 0 | ♦ | ♦ | +1 | ♦ | ♦ | +2 |
| • |
A +/- icon will appear on the LCD screen when you change the exposure setting from 0 (zero).
Take a series of photographs at 0, -1, -2, +1, and +2.
Go to Exposure Compensation.
Your camera may have auto bracketing.
You set the range of exposures.
Then, you either press the shutter release once, and the camera takes several photographs by itself.
Or, you click several times, to do all of the bracketed exposures, yourself.
Don't judge the exposure, contrast, and color of your photographs based on what you see on your camera's LCD screen.
LCD screens are inaccurate.
If you can save your photographs using a RAW file format, do so.
RAW files are the unprocessed output of the sensor.
You can process the RAW files for optimum exposure, contrast, and white balance.
Your camera may be able to save your photographs as both RAW and JPEG files.
You can set your exposure manually.
Go to Manual Exposure.
Use the Light Values Chart for settings.
If your camera has a noise reduction feature, select the feature.
For example, with a Nikon, the Long Exposure setting will automatically take a second exposure without opening the mechanical shutter.
This second exposure, called a dark exposure, "photographs" the noise created by the sensor.
The noise is created by the heat of the sensor.
This heat noise is then subtracted from the initial exposure.
You'll want to get, eventually, a remote shutter release.
By tripping the shutter remotely, you won't create any camera shake.
If the moment of exposure isn't important, you can use the self-timer of your camera to trip the shutter.
Experiment with:
• Camera movement.
• Zooming during long exposures.
• Using the Night Portrait and Night Landscape exposure modes.
The flash will illuminate the foreground, and the shutter will remain open long enough to properly expose the background.
• Painting with light.
Wear dark clothing so your ghost won't appear in the photographs.
Use a long exposure, and use a flashlight and other light sources to illuminate the scene.
Avoid getting between a surface that you're painting and the camera.
Otherwise, your silhouette will appear in the photograph.
When you're done for the evening, change the camera settings back to the ones you use most often.
For example, check the LCD screen of your camera for the absence of the +/- icon.
If you see the icon, change the exposure compensation back to 0.0.
Go to Night Photography for a selection of night photographers, including those who paint with light.